A HELICOPTER pilot banned from taking off until the chopper he’d landed in a village car park was checked out was fined after he ignored the instruction.

Christopher Kiley, 57, was flying to Monmouth on March 14 when he feared an engine problem after the clutch light came on.

He landed his bright red ’copter on an unused car park at the end of Station Road by the Co-Op store in Treorchy instead of following protocol and landing it on a playing field just metres away, before walking to the nearby CK Stores to make an emergency call to his engineer.

Following a telephone conversation he went back to the helicopter ready for take-off after completing the necessary inspections, but by that time the police had arrived, landing their own helicopter close by.

The Civil Aviation Authority also got involved and, following a discussion, he was banned from taking off until they deemed the craft fit to fly and issued a notice to that effect, which he signed – before flying off again.

Simon Emslie, prosecuting at Merthyr Tydfil Crown Court on behalf of the Civil Aviation Authority, said: “He was told not to fly the helicopter out.”

He said that the defendant’s engineer had tried to make contact with him to tell him not to fly the machine.

“But the defendant had done exactly what he was told not to do by the notice he had signed.”

The court heard that Kiley, of Caswell Bay, Swansea – who is listed as the managing director of CK Stores on its website – had not wanted to leave the helicopter where it was because he was frightened of the damage that could be done to it.

The court was told he had endangered the lives of the people living in Treorchy because if there had been a problem with the engine, the helicopter would have just dropped “like a brick” and there would have been no way to land.

Martin James, an investigator with the Civil Aviation Authority, said: “He put his own interests before the people of Treorchy.”

Kiley, representing himself, said that he had made the “split second decision” to land on the car park because of the troubles he knew would result from recovering the helicopter from an enclosed playing field.

Kiley, who has flown planes since 1982 and helicopters since 1993, said he had never been in trouble before and his licence had been suspended since the incident.

“I was stupidly overcome by the real worry that if I left the helicopter there overnight it would have been completely vandalised,” he said.

“Children were already there with cans of cider. I had visions of it being completely wrecked.”

Kiley, who admitted failing without reasonable excuse to comply with a direction given before Pontypridd magistrates, who committed him for sentence, said he would have slept with the helicopter and added: “I always thought that having a licence was a great privilege with great responsibility.”

Judge John Curran fined Kiley £2,000 and ordered him to pay £3,873.19 with a £15 victim surcharge within 28 days.

The offence carries a maximum two years’ in prison and/or an unlimited fine.